


A Part Of Something

by icarus_chained



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Character Development, Character Study, Developing Relationship, Fear, Friendship/Love, Gen, Introspection, Nightmares, Partnership, Soul Bond, Teamwork
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-18
Updated: 2016-06-18
Packaged: 2018-07-15 21:52:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7239904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icarus_chained/pseuds/icarus_chained
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It takes so much work to be part of something bigger than yourself, a team, a partnership. Especially when you were maybe not the best suited people in the first place. They're getting better at it, though. It's worth it. Jax believes that so much, and he knows Grey ain't far behind him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Part Of Something

The thing was, Jax had always loved being part of a team. He really, genuinely did. There was nothing else like that in the world. If somebody asked him to choose, if he could only keep one feeling for the rest of his life, he thought he'd want it to be that. Being part of something. Knowing the people around him were part of it too. Knowing that whatever happened, whatever came against them, they were gonna stand up and move together and keep each other safe. They were going to win or fall together, and worth it either way.

Not everybody believed that. There'd been people who thought he was faking it or something, putting it on to act like he was better than he was, some shit like that. Like they thought that, somewhere deep down, everybody was only ever really out for themselves, and trying to act otherwise was just lying to people to make yourself look better. And he wasn't ... He wasn't saying he wasn't selfish. He wasn't saying he never wanted things for himself, he wasn't saying he didn't want some credit here or there when he'd done something to deserve it. Nobody wanted to be ignored, man. Nobody wanted to be trodden down. Jax didn't want that either, he wasn't going to claim otherwise. But that ... that was different. That was something else. Being part of team, it wasn't about not getting the credit. It was ...

It was knowing that if you fell down, you could reach out your hand, and somebody would reach out to pull you back up. It was knowing that if you were hurt, somebody would protect you. It was knowing that when _they_ were hurt, they trusted you to do the same. It was knowing that it wasn't just you anymore, it wasn't just what you could do that mattered, but what everyone around you could do, on their own and all together, to make something bigger than any of 'em. When you were inside that, when you were part of that, you could _feel_ it. You could feel the shape and the power and the protection of everyone around you. You could look at the biggest, most dangerous guy on the field, and you could think 'that guy's on _my_ side'. You could look at the smallest and the most damaged, and you could think, 'it's okay, he's not gonna get hurt, me and the rest of the guys are gonna look out for him'. It was just ... there was nothing like it in the world, man. It didn't make you feel powerful, it made you feel _safe_. It made you feel safe, and ready, and able to do anything.

There was power in that. More than anybody thought. It wasn't about giving something up, giving away choice or credit or autonomy. It was about giving something _to_ , and getting something _back_. Having somebody's back. Knowin' they had yours. It wasn't about giving in to somebody. It was about being _part_ of them.

And Firestorm ... Firestorm was so much more than that. So much more than any other team Jax had ever been part of it. The whole crew, the Legends, they were all like that. This team was the best thing he'd ever been part of in his life. But Firestorm ... He didn't even have words for that. For that feeling, for being literally, genuinely, _a part of someone_. That deep. Not all the way down, not so much that he disappeared inside of it. He knew Grey was afraid of that sometimes, that Grey held back a lot because of it, and being honest Jax wasn't too keen on the idea himself. He didn't want to disappear. Like he said, it wasn't that he wasn't selfish. He didn't want to vanish forever inside of somebody. But they didn't go that far. It was okay, they weren't like that. There was always Jax and there was always Grey. They were just ... they were a part of each other. They were a team on a level Jax didn't have it in him to describe.

Or they would be, anyway. They _could_ be. Jax could feel it when they managed it. He could feel it when they got it right, when they didn't even have to think or to talk, when Jax would just reach and Grey would just answer, when Grey would just prod and Jax would just move, and together they could make something the whole world would answer to. They had so much potential. Like any team, when they trained together, when they trusted each other, they had so much power to do things right.

And he knew ... he knew it wasn't that Grey didn't _get_ that. That wasn't it, that had never been the problem. They were getting there, and it'd never been just Grey that was the problem, despite what Grey himself seemed to think sometimes. It took time to trust somebody, that was all. Jax loved being part of a team, but it wasn't that he forget how much was involved in it. Especially for them. They had each other's whole lives in their hands. You had to _work_ to be able to trust somebody with that. You had to be patient, and learn, and listen to each other, and yeah, Jax was gonna admit that neither of them had ever been the best at that. Man, Grey just made him so _frustrated_ sometimes. He drove Grey all the way up the wall himself. They were an odd mix to put together, they were a strange pair of partners, and it was a lot of work to keep that right.

So they had ... trouble. A _lot_ of trouble, fortunately only some of it the deadly kind. And Grey ... Grey had more of it than him. He wasn't knocking the man or anything. He wasn't trying to pass the blame, they both had enough of that. It was just that Grey was ...

Grey was afraid of them. Always had been. Jax had always felt that, even if he hadn't always understood where it was coming from or what exactly it was pointed at. It wasn't that Grey didn't want to be part of a team, or didn't know how to be. He was pushy, yeah, but he was also protective, and generous, and willing to work for people no matter what. He enjoyed it, too. He might act grumpy and like he couldn't stand people, but Jax could _feel_ him. He knew how much Grey actually adored being able to work with people, to share with people and argue with people, to help make something and share giddy triumph with everyone who'd been part of it. Grey did understand that. He loved it just as much as Jax did. He'd said that, once, and maybe Jax hadn't believed him as much then as he did now. Grey knew how to be on a team. He might blow his own trumpet a lot, but he'd blow everyone else's just as easily.

... And that had sounded a lot less dirty before Jax had thought it. _Jeez_. Okay, Jax, moving rapidly on from that ...

The point was, Grey knew how to be part of something. Grey _wanted_ to be part of something. This thing they had, this thing they could _be_ , that wasn't the part of it that scared him. It was how badly it could go wrong that did that. It was how far it could go and how much he could lose. Because for Grey it _had_ gone wrong, and it'd gone wrong a lot more times and in a lot more ways than Jax wanted to think about.

Grey didn't want to feel too much in case he lost the person he was feeling about. Grey didn't want to join too far in case he couldn't get back out again. Grey didn't want to work too close together in case he started forgetting which one of them was doing what, and then which one of them was _who_. Grey didn't want to be in control in case he couldn't stop. He didn't want anyone else in control in case _they_ couldn't stop. Or wouldn't. Grey didn't want to have too much power in case he lost himself and hurt somebody with it, or let someone else hurt them through him. He had a lot of issues, Grey. Jax wasn't sure he even _knew_ how many he had, most of the time. He wasn't sure Grey always knew why he was afraid this time around, or even noticed that what he was feeling was in fact fear. 

Grey had funny reactions to being scared sometimes. He was fucking _terrifying_ , sometimes. Man had no concept whatsoever of his own safety. It drove Jax nuts, it really did. He'd watched Grey almost get himself killed he didn't know how many times. Grey when he was scared was the worst thing to have to look out for on the planet. In the _universe_. And Jax would swear sometimes Grey just didn't even realise.

Jax hadn't either. For _so long_ , he hadn't had the first clue what the hell made this crazy old man tick. He wasn't going to blame himself for that. He'd like to see anybody else figure Martin goddamn Stein out inside a day. Or a year. Clarissa had had a couple of decades, hadn't she? And Ronnie ... but they'd had their own problems, those two. They'd had their own things to work through. Jax wasn't going to be too hard on himself for having his own.

But then ... then he'd started to get it. Slowly but surely, the further they went on, he started to get more and more of what Grey was thinking, what he was feeling, why he was feeling it. And some of that was because Jax was feeling it too. Not just from Grey, not just a reflection. Some of it he'd felt on his own merits, and from things that had happened to him.

He knew what it was like now to lose yourself inside something, to become something different and not know it until it was undone. He knew what it was like to lose control and become a monster, to hurt people and almost kill someone you loved. He could thank Savage and a meteor in 1958 for that. Jax had an idea now what it would be like to be stuck inside someone and helpless to stop them using you. He'd felt Stein when that Russian bitch had taken him. He'd been part of him, he'd _felt_ it. And he knew what it was like to almost lose someone. To be close enough to be a part of them, and then _lose_ them. Not just in 1986. Grey had sent him away. When he was dying. Grey had sent him back in time, and Jax had _felt_ the bond stretch because of it. He'd felt Grey dying, somewhere in the future and outside of time and so far beyond where Jax could reach him. He'd felt that happen. He'd been standing beside another Grey, a different, more distant Grey, a Grey that wasn't _his_ , and he'd felt the echoes along the link as his own partner slowly died.

So he ... he knew what Grey was afraid of, now. He _knew_ , all the way down to the bone. He'd felt ... the echoes between them. They'd shared nightmares a time or two. Literally. Jax wasn't sure if that had been an intended perk or not. He hadn't talked to Grey about it. They didn't ... they didn't talk about a lot, really. Maybe they should. No, almost definitely they should. Jax wasn't sure the nightmares would be the right place to start, though. Dreaming of claws and teeth, a mindless hunting instinct, and feeling it shift and merge with fire boiling out of control, burning a friend alive in front of him. Dreaming of a launch bay door closing between them, of a snap and a wrench inside his chest as the whole of time slammed down between them, and feeling it merge into a different, more permanent snap, a tearing all the way as he tumbled through the sky and felt an absence, a gaping hole inside of him.

Yeah, no. That wasn't exactly a conversation opener. That wasn't something you started with. Even when they both knew they'd shared them. Even when they'd both crawled out of bed and haunted the ship together afterwards, orbited each other nervously and silently just to make sure they were both still there. They didn't talk about it. They probably weren't going to for quite a while yet. Jax admitted that straight up about himself, and nobody in their right _mind_ was gonna bet on Grey being any less stubborn than him.

Anyway. Not the point. They'd get to the talking part eventually. Jax was pretty sure they had to, at some point. There was only so much you could share with someone before you had to ... to mention it, to acknowledge it, something. They did need a conversation. Especially if ... if they were ever going to get better than they were now. If they were ever going to learn how to get it right all the time, or even just most of it. They had to talk about this sometime.

But the thing was ... They weren't doing so badly. Not now, not anymore. They actually weren't. They didn't ... they were _part_ of each other. They knew each other, they were learning each other more and more all the time. Whether they wanted to or not, sometimes. Grey was just ... he was _there_. He was always there. Inside Jax, inside his head and inside his chest, this ball of anger and joy and grump and pompousness and kindness and aggravation and breathtaking generosity. And that was ...

It was never just the fear. That was the thing, that was always the thing. There was always going to be an enemy team, always somebody or something your team had to fight against. Okay? There was always going to be fear. The point of a team was, you had something to get you _past_ it, more than just your own stupid and terrifying bravery. You had something around you, something inside you, that gave you the strength to get you past it. And they could do that, him and Grey. They had that, they had it in _spades_ , they could do this.

Because Jax, he knew what Grey was afraid of now. He was afraid of it himself, he'd seen enough of it to be more than terrified all by his lonesome. But he knew what was standing against it, too. He knew what they were, he knew what they could _do_. They were stronger than this. They were strong enough for anything.

He'd felt it. When they got it right. Firestorm. It was ... it was so much. It was so big. Grey had so much inside of him. You could feel that. When you were part of a team, when you were making the play, when you could see and know and _feel_ everyone around you doing their thing and feeding together and making something bigger than all of them. That rush, that sense of pulling together, becoming one thing, being a part of something huge. And the way they joined, Jax could feel _all_ of Grey. He could feel ... decades of knowledge and pain and joy and discovery, he could feel anger and righteousness and protectiveness, fear and giddy relief, he could feel _will_. Call it will, call it stubbornness, either way Grey could grab hold of an entire timeline and make it turn the other way if he was pushed enough. Jax could feel that. When he was Firestorm, when he was holding fire in his hands and fighting to keep it all inside him, fighting to keep it going the right way, he could feel that behind him. Wrapped around him, wrapped through him, all that terrifying, aggravating, _amazing_ will.

Martin Stein was a crazy old man. Really, truly, a _crazy_ old man. There was never a more terrifying thing to have in your head, or a more annoying one either, but _man_. Man, what a rush. When they got it right. When they worked together. That time with the meteor. Jax had felt him. He'd felt Grey come up in a surge around him, felt his partner come up and come _through_ , push all of that strength and that will and that personality not just _at_ him but _into_ him, bolstering him up on the wave of it, and he'd felt something click. He'd felt something change, that flash of perfection when you felt the play go through and knew in your heart and soul that nobody could stop it. The rock had turned to water under his hands. Grey had burned inside him like a fire. It had been the most beautiful feeling in all the world.

That's what they were. This team, this partnership, _that's_ what they were. They could fly, they could set the world on fire, they could turn water into wine and base metals into gold if they wanted to, and none of that was the point. None of that was what Firestorm _was_. But that moment. That one moment, right there. That had been them. _That_ had been the point.

And Grey had felt it too. Had understood it, finally, at last. Not that he hadn't before, exactly, not that he'd never _wanted_ to, it was just ... fear made you confused. It made you flinch, curl up, or flail around in a panic, bull through the worst way possible because you couldn't see any way else. And Grey didn't always notice when he was afraid. He didn't always know why he was doing what he did until after he'd done it. But that moment. Just that moment, just feeling what it was like when they got it _right_. In a way they never had before, deeper than they ever had before. Transmutation pulled so much out of them both. Jax's control, Grey's knowledge, all the power and will they both could bring to bear. They weren't used to it yet. It took everything they had. But they'd gotten it _right_.

They could do that again. It took work, being on a team. It took time and practice and trust. You didn't just pull it out of nowhere, you had to _know_ who you had beside you, you had to know who they were and what they needed and what they could do. You had to trust them, you had to be ready to fight for them, you had to have faith that they would fight for you. All of that took work. But that was okay. It always had been. That was what you had to give to be part of something, and if the team was right, it was worth it every step of the way.

That wasn't a question for this. For them. It had been at the start, but it wasn't now. Jax knew Grey now. He knew Grey would fight for him, he knew Grey would _die_ for him. Literally. He knew he'd die for Grey in return. He knew it'd be worth it. He ... he knew Grey loved him, was terrified of him, was terrified _for_ him. He knew it mostly because he felt exactly the same way. He knew they were too deep now, coiled too tight, to ever be right again if they lost each other. He knew that, as terrifying as that was, it was also ... one of the best and most comforting thoughts he'd ever had. Because Grey was part of him. That person, that mind and that soul he felt inside his chest and inside his head. That person would always be part of him. He would always feel him, even if he was taken away, just like Grey had never stopped feeling Ronnie. They were part of something that could never completely be taken away.

They were something deeper, stronger, than any other team Jax had ever been part of. They were doing something more important than anything else he'd ever done in his life. They were part of something, part of each other and part of something else, bigger than he'd ever dreamed of. That was ... that was worth any amount of fear. That was worth any amount of trouble. All the nightmares in the world, they were worth it, just to be part of that. Jax knew that. He _wanted_ that. And he knew that Grey did too. He knew that Grey always had.

They just ... they had to work on it some more, that was all. They had to practice, they had to train together. They had to keep listening, keep paying attention. Keep forgiving. A lot of that last one. Being part of a team, it didn't just _happen_ , wouldn't just stay there if you let it slide. Okay, him and Grey, maybe it had a bit, maybe it would. They were stuck together, that part wasn't going to change any time soon. But making it work was a different thing. Getting it _right_. You didn't just get that part for free.

That was okay, though. Jax had never been scared of working for something, and neither had Grey either. They could do this. They _could_ do this. And they wanted to as well. They'd felt enough now to know just how much it was gonna be worth it.

So. Guess it was like coach always said, huh? Time to get out of yourself and into the team.

If a bit more literally, in their case, than Jax thought his coach had probably intended.


End file.
